The Stupid is Strong With This One

It’s hard to believe that a letter like this could possibly be real, or that anybody could possibly be this stupid. But it is, and they are.

I am a math teacher at Brockton High School, the site of a school shooting earlier this month.

Note that this is a teacher, who is (presumably) an educated person; part of whose job it is to be concerned about students.

Current school security procedures lock down school populations in the event of armed assault. Some advocate abandoning this practice as it holds everyone in place, allowing a shooter easily to find victims. An alternative to lockdown is immediate exodus via announcement. Although this removes potential hostages and makes it nearly impossible for the shooter to acquire preselected targets, it unfairly rewards resourceful children who move to safety off-site more shrewdly and efficiently than others. Schools should level playing fields, not intrinsically reward those more resourceful. A level barrel is fair to all fish.

Allowing the children to run to safety isn’t “fair” because some children will be faster or smarter than others; the only fair solution is to keep them trapped because shooting fish in a barrel (he actually uses that metaphor) presumably gives all of the children equal odds on living or dying… Unfortunately, since more children (all of them, in fact) will be at risk in a “level barrel” scenario, with potentially higher casualties, then the average odds of being shot (number of casualties divided by total number of students) is higher for the student bodies – er, body. Of course, the typical socialist doesn’t care if everybody is sick, poor, and miserable; as long as they are equally sick, poor, and miserable; the same philosophy applies here.

Some propose overturning laws that made schools gun-free zones even for teachers who may be licensed to securely carry concealed firearms elsewhere. They argue that barring licensed-carry only ensures a defenseless, target-rich environment. But as a progressive, I would sooner lay my child to rest than succumb to the belief that the use of a gun for self-defense is somehow not in itself a gun crime.

DOUG VAN GORDER
Quincy
Letter to the Editor, The Boston Globe

So not only is he a horrible teacher who doesn’t care about his students, he’s also a horrible parent who would rather see his son die than have him be saved by politically-incorrect methods. Saving his son’s life would be a crime. I have to wonder what this moron’s son thinks, reading this letter in the paper – assuming that his son is even capable of reading, given what a horrible teacher, father, and all-around human being Doug van Gorder is. Someone needs to tell Dougie that Harrison Bergeron was a satire, not a set of guidelines. (H/T Before It’s News)

“Make Mine Freedom”

I got this from HillBuzz. It’s a fifty-year-old cartoon about a familiar-looking snake oil salesman named Doctor Utopia who’s peddling “ISM” to America. All you have to do is sign away all of your freedom and and everything you and your children and grandchildren will ever own, and the government will take care of you… ISM even promises to make the weather perfect every day. Very prophetic; and now I know why HillBuzz is always referring to the president as Dr. Utopia.

Educator, Teach Thyself

Those who can’t, teach; and those who can’t teach, join unions to make sure they keep their jobs anyway. This union is apparently trying to implement their “No Teacher Left Behind” program…

Central Falls, RI – A Rhode Island school district has voted to fire all the teachers at an underperforming school. The Central Falls School Committee voted Tuesday evening to fire every educator at Central Falls High School, including teachers, guidance counselors and the principal. It’s the only school in the tiny, impoverished city north of Providence. Only about half its students graduate, and only 7 percent of 11th-graders were proficient in math in 2009. The plan was developed because of a federal effort to makeover failing schools. The Central Falls Teachers Union says it is reviewing legal options and hasn’t decided what action to take. Education Secretary Arne Duncan applauds the decision and says “when schools continue to struggle we have a collective obligation to take action.”

Forget firings; the former staff at that school are lucky that they aren’t liable to be sued for malpractice. But then, teachers’ unions have never cared about the welfare of the students, because of course the students aren’t the ones paying them union dues.

Look At Me Dissenting!

Normally, I enjoy reading Weasel Zippers (it’s right there on my blogroll, meaning I check it out at least once on the average day) and find myself in general agreement. However, I think that “Washington DC Police Enforcing Sharia Law” is a misleading and inaccurate headline, and I take issue with it.

Some women who protested at the Islamic Center of Washington, wanting to be able to worship in the main prayer hall with their male counterparts, were asked to leave by the police. But they say their struggle will continue. … Over the weekend, [Jannah B’int] Hannah and approximately 20 other women prayed in the main hall, but D.C. police were called. They asked them to leave or be arrested. … In two out of every three American mosques, women of separate prayer spaces around the country.[sic]

As I explained on C2, in response to the question “what crime would the DC police have arrested those women for?”

Trespassing? As distasteful as it is, the mosque gets to set its own rules for what its people are allowed to do inside, and can call the police for people who break the rules and refuse to leave. … If the women refused to leave, and the men from the mosque attempted to physically remove the women themselves, they might have been vulnerable to assault charges. I think their only two choices (assuming the women couldn’t be convinced to leave of their own volition) were to call the police or to let them remain. Obviously, we think the second choice was the correct one; but it’s not up to us.

In response to the question “Would the cops interfere in an Orthodox Jewish service where they still seperate men from women?”

The police were called, and arrests made, in the 80s and 90s when ACTUP were staging protests inside Catholic churches. People were in church who didn’t belong there, according to the church, so the police were called to remove them. We don’t have to agree with the mosque (far from it!) to admit that they were within their rights. … Muslims have every right to set policies like this for their members. The points where we should object are

1. Where they try to set policies for their members which violate the law (honor killings, sharia courts, etc.)
2. Where they try to set policies for people who are not members of their religion (trying to impose sharia on the rest of us, etc.) I’ve never had any of my Jewish friends tell me that *I* couldn’t eat bacon; they understood that their rules were for them and my rules were for me.
3. Where they violate the right of people to leave their religion (apostates). Anyone who voluntarily chooses to join or stay with a religion is choosing to consent to their rules; but no religion has a right to keep people against their will.

My sympathies are entirely with these women; but the mosque broke no laws in having them evicted. When you exercise civil disobedience, you must always be aware of and prepared for the consequences.

There’s more to the discussion than the above, but that’s the general gist. I didn’t enjoy defending the mosque, but they were within their rights. Anyway, the consensus is that I was right.

Palin by Comparison

Updates have been light recently as work and my personal life take up more of my time, but I’m still trying to at least keep up with the news… if only so that I know what’s really happening, as opposed to what my liberal friends are saying. Sarah Palin has been back in the media with appearances on FOX and her speeches to CPAC and the Tea Party, so naturally she’s receiving plenty of argumentum ad feminem attacks from the left who can’t be bothered to listen to what she’s actually saying, much less honestly respond to what she’s saying. In addition to the “she’s so dumb” stereotypes that are thrown against all conservatives (because in their eyes, by definition, anybody intelligent would have to be a liberal and vice versa) are the continuing comments about her “experience” or lack thereof. Here’s a news flash:

People also keep saying that “she won’t actually run in 2012” or, if she does, “she can’t possibly win.” Clearly, the left does not believe either of these statements, or else they wouldn’t be making her the star of their daily five minute hate sessions. If they really thought that she couldn’t possibly win, they’d be doing everything in their power to make sure that she was the GOP nominee… you know, like they did with guaranteed loser John McCain.

Great Ad

(H/T: Rain of Lead, 2.0)

Learning From History

Would anyone fall for the Trojan Horse today? Craig finds out when he leaves a full-sized replica horse (with concealed Trojans) outside a number of security-sensitive buildings.

This one is an oldie, but a goodie. I just dug it up today when someone elsewhere mentioned the Trojan Horse strategy. Apparently, quite a few people (but not everyone!) haven’t learned the lessons of history. On a not-very-related note, Zombie’s “How Climate-Change Dance Theory spells the end of a movement” draws historical parallels between the latest round of moonbat behavior with Vietnam protesters and Native Americans who didn’t realize that they’d already lost the war.

Crow Nation Tea Party

According to the Billings [Montana] Gazette, “The Crow Nation 1825 Peace Treaty Allotee Land Commission join[ed] the Tea Party movement in hopes to end government control on the Crow reservation.” (video) Just another bunch of white supremacists, I’m sure… (H/T myselfandi, 2.0)

Art Therapy at the Asylum

If you do a Google image search of “Obama Unicorn Painting”, you get “about 130,000” results – That’s a whole lot of Kool-Aid drinkers being supplied with paints and easels by somebody. Why paint? Because they just eat the other art supplies, like crayons and paste. Warning: naked Obama paintings may be considered unsafe in your workplace, until 2011 when they become mandatory by executive order. (H/T HillBuzz.)

When Leftwing Worlds Collide

There’s an old joke about why groups like PeTA tend to focus more on people wearing furs than people wearing leather – because it’s safer to throw a bucket of red paint on a rich old lady than on an angry biker. Well, apparently PeTA has taken that mockery to heart, even if they’re ignoring the continual mockery of each and every single other thing they do. Last month, in a blatant example of “be careful what you wish for”, PeTA asked the leather community to remove its clothes:

Between the ASGRA gay rodeo and leather weekend, the gay community ensures that D.C. will experience an influx of both chaps and animal rights activists at least twice a year. … “We hope that when people see how easy it is to look sleazy without wearing leather, they’ll be sympathetic,” says Dan Mathews, who is gay and Director of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). “It’s easy to have a look that kills without killing.” A handful of PETA activists braved subfreezing temperatures and arctic-like wind chills to encourage Mid-Atlantic Leather (MAL) Weekend participants to eschew their animal-based ensembles. To showcase what they view as a viable alternative to clothes made of cowhide, the activists were dressed in “Pleather” jackets, skirts, pants and hats. One activist wore a cow suit and held a sign that read “Fashion Victim: Leather is Dead Skin – Think About It.” “It’s the 21st century,” says Kayla Worden, campaign coordinator for PETA…

It’s the 21st century, and yet they’re still using their old circus sideshow techniques to try to make a point. Actually, it’s arguable whether or not PeTA has ever made a cogent point, or convinced someone to change their minds (as opposed to simply preaching to the choir); but they don’t care, as long as the money keeps rolling in from brain-dead celebrities who want to look like they “care” about “issues”. Still, going after a bunch of guys wearing leather, carrying whips, and whatnot is more courageous than PeTA usually is; but the gay community is not likely to heed their message. First of all, you’re talking about a group of people who are very particular about their clothes (see the wrap-up at the end of the article, below); and second, the gay community and PeTA have a history of conflict, given PeTA’s opposition to all animal testing, including that required to research AIDS medications.

Democratic Ego Inflation

MMX Flex poses the following question:

In case you haven’t heard … President Obama’s new budget includes a big increase for the Smithsonian Institution. The museum complex will receive a record-breaking $797.4 million in 2010. Apparently, $761.4 million in 2009 just wasn’t enough. With so much of our money going here, it got us thinking – is the Smithsonian Institute fair and balanced?

I thought that the Smithsonian’s liberal bias was “settled science”, given the way they’ve been caught putting a left-wing anti-American spin on many exhibits – which blew up in their face when they tried to use the Enola Gay exhibit on the fiftieth anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing to “[depict] Japanese as victims” of a United States “motivated by vengeance” (the script, which went through many revisions due to public and Congressional scrutiny and outrage, also “unilaterally … reduc[ed] by 75 percent the estimate of American casualties that would have resulted from an invasion of Japan”).

“Do you want to do an exhibit to make veterans feel good, or do you want an exhibition that will lead our visitors to think about the consequences of the atomic bombing of Japan? Frankly, I don’t think we can do both.” –Tom Crouch, NASM curator

Anyway, to answer their question, MMX Flex “visited the popular Portraits of the Presidents exhibit at the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery in downtown Washington and snapped a few pictures.” Visit MMX Flex‘s page to see the pictures; all of the recent Democratic presidents have huge portraits, while the Republican presidents have only modest, standard-sized portraits … at best.

A portrait of President Nixon hangs on the opposite side of the Carter wall. The Nixon portrait is quite small (we were unable to find a smaller presidential portrait in the gallery) and dimly lit. Probably just a coincidence … Or maybe this is what they meant by “warmly intimate.”

One commenter mocked the “inflation” received by all of the Democrats, particularly Carter; but the bias is clear to see. If they could get away with it, would they be airbrushing the Republicans out of history entirely, like the Soviet Union famously did to their people who fell by the political wayside? As part of this phenomenon, consider also the massive “cult of personality” portraits of Obama which cover the walls of the White House, making it “almost a shrine to Obama.”

Was That It?

Iran has been saying for a while now that “Iran will deliver telling blow to global powers on February 11,” the “31st anniversary of the ‘Islamic Revolution’.” Well, we’ve been waiting (and chortling) to see what this “harsh blow to global arrogance” will be… Well, so far all they’ve done is permanently suspend Google mail, in anticipation of a national email service for Iranian citizens.

It wasn’t clear late Wednesday what effect the order had on Gmail services in Iran, or even if Iran had implemented its new policy. Iranian officials have claimed technological advances in the past that they haven’t been able to execute. Google didn’t have an immediate comment about the announcement.

I’m not sure what comment they’d be expected to have, other than “BFD!” or “Bwahaha!” Then again, it must hurt their cold, dark leftie hearts at Google that they’ve now been spurned by two evil totalitarian regimes in as many months. Oh well, they still have Obama.